


Pieces

by NellieOleson



Category: Stargate SG-1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-08
Updated: 2012-04-08
Packaged: 2017-11-03 07:30:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/378866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NellieOleson/pseuds/NellieOleson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post Heroes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pieces

~~When you lose something you can't replace  
     When you love someone but it goes to waste  
     Could it be worse?--Coldplay  
  
  
  
  
  
She almost quits after Janet dies. But not because of Janet. Not really.  
  
******  
  
Sam squints in the glare of an alien sun and surveys the battlefield. They’re surrounded by Jaffa, and she can feel the adrenaline racing through her body. The dust, noise, and sweat are clinging to her like tentacles, but these distractions drop away as she takes aim at the closest target. The Jaffa drops like a bag of marbles. They just might come out of this on top.  
  
Her world lurches in the flash of a staff weapon and smells like charred flesh as it grinds to a halt.  
  
A desperate shout is all she can offer while the color bleeds out of her vision. Sepia toned dust rises around him. His cap is laying on the ground; she’s not sure why she notices. She runs to his side without thinking and doesn’t leave it until they’re back in the infirmary surrounded by artificial lights and doctors who are not Janet.  
  
But Janet _is_ there.  
  
In a bag.  
  
The infirmary is hectic; they don’t usually get this many wounded at once. Everyone has a job to do. _Places to go, people to see._ Moving Janet’s body to the morgue doesn’t seem to be one of them. Or maybe the remaining medical officers just want Janet around for one last hurrah. Her body anyway.  
  
Janet’s _body_.  
  
Her chest tightens and she turns away. Nobody is paying attention to her but she feels like a slide under a microscope just the same. She looks over at Colonel O’Neill and thinks she might be seeing her breakfast in a much less enticing state soon. It’s not the sight of his wound that turns her stomach, it’s the relief she feels.  
  
Relief it’s not him in that damn bag.  
  
She slips out when they start cutting through his clothes.  
  
******  
  
Sam finds him sedated when she returns so she sits by his bed and holds his hand because he won’t remember anyway. The steady pulsing of his monitor keeps her company while her mind takes a coffee break. She stays until the nursing staff starts tossing uneasy glances in her direction. Knowing glances laced with pity. She wants to yell at them but doesn’t; she’s already given them enough to talk about.  
  
_Don’t they understand he could have died out there?_  
  
She walks back to her quarters while her mind plays the image of him hitting the ground on a continuous loop. _For her viewing pleasure._  
  
_Where the hell was Daniel?_  
  
******  
  
Colonel O’Neill’s in a private room the next time Sam sees him. She wants to tell him she’s been thinking about quitting, but the words don’t come and Janet’s still in a bag so they talk about Cassie instead.  
  
They manage to have a conversation without actually saying anything for a while. It’s something they’ve perfected. She tries again to tell him why she’s there, but this time her mouth betrays her in a different way and wants to say too much. Her brain makes an effort to step in before it’s too late.  
  
It turns out her brain has poor timing.  
  
Because he’s holding her and she doesn’t ever want him to stop.  
  
Janet’s probably in the morgue by now.  
  
His hands linger at her sides, and she closes her eyes trying to etch the moment onto the backs of her eyelids. His fingers twitch and she feels the movement magnified a thousand times through the fabric of her shirt. Sam thinks she’s done enough crying for one day, but her body disagrees. His arms coax her closer, tentatively at first, then with more confidence and she feels the warmth of his breath on the side of her head.  
  
“Carter?”  
  
She maintains radio silence; the cycle of denial is hard to let go.  
  
He doesn’t press her. She thinks he probably shouldn’t know her so well.  
  
The hand that has been burning into the small of her back makes its way to her face and lifts her chin. She focuses the wall above his shoulder.  
  
“Carter?” He tries again. Her eyes burn and the wall can’t compete with the pull he has on her. She has to look at him.  
  
There’s an open look on his face she hasn’t seen since they were cogs in a wheel trying to save their planet from an unrelenting ice. _Happier times_ her mind whispers.  
  
Memories slide by in flashes of heat, grime, and Jonah. And not for the first time, she finds herself regretting the failure of the memory stamp. It’s a fleeting regret that usually finds her alone in the dark and stays with her until morning. Leaving her with too much extra room in her bed and a handful of what-if’s and could-have-been’s.  
  
Later she’ll ask what he saw on her face but he won’t remember, or he maybe he’ll just be unable to articulate it. _Maybe he just won’t want to tell you._  
  
But he sees something.  
  
His lips are on hers and he’s so warm and gentle, and as brief as it is, it might be the most intense thing she’s ever been subjected to.  
  
He starts to pull away, but she needs more from him and she can feel her scalp tingling. He really should try to talk to her again she thinks in the moment before her hand wraps around his neck.  
  
This kiss is not gentle.  
  
It’s everything. It’s not enough. She can feel him holding back and _who would have thought he’d be the one with more restraint?_  
  
She lets him go because she’s being unfair and she knows it.  
  
“I shouldn’t have done that,” she whispers into his neck. “I just-“  
  
“I know, Carter. I know.” He holds her tighter and she reminds herself to keep breathing. _How can he be this understanding?_  
  
Her mouth sees an opening and takes it. “I’m not sure I can do this anymore,” it tells his shoulder.  
  
“This? As in?”  
  
He’s giving her an out but she passes it up. “As in watch you die.”  
  
“I didn’t die.”  
  
“You could have.” _I could have._  
  
“It’s what we do, Carter. It’s who we are.”  
  
_//She rolled onto her back and shivered as the cool air moved over her damp skin._  
  
Jonah stretched out by her side and pulled on her faded orange coat, covering her as much as possible. “So is this one of the things you like about this place?”  
  
“It’s at the top of my list,” she admitted.  
  
“You keep a list?”//  
  
The memory comes unexpectedly. Sharp and intense and everything she can’t have. “Maybe it’s not who I want to be.”  
  
He’s still holding her as he considers her words. “Maybe you should go before this conversation turns into something we’ll regret.”  
  
Sam’s become quite adept at living with regret, but he’s right. There’s no point in this. She lets the conversation die there.  
  
Because she’s also become quite adept at dealing with death.  
  
******  
  
In the end, it’s Teal’c’s eulogy that keeps her from quitting.  
  
_Because how many lives has she saved through her actions?_  
  
_And how many of those lives would you trade to have Janet back?_  
  
She wasn’t expecting the question but she thinks the answer is something she’d rather not admit.  
  
Even to herself.


End file.
